David:   Loneliness. Do you sometimes feel lonely? Often? Well, a lot of people do, and the truth be told that number keeps getting bigger here in America no less. Before we go, that’s our podcast theme and it’s a way of reminding us that there are a lot of subjects we want to explore together before we depart this world.

Karen:   Before we go.

David:   Yeah, stick around, okay?

Intro:     Welcome to the Before We Go Podcast featuring Dr. David Mains and his wife, noted author Karen Mains. Here’s David and Karen Mains.

David:   Loneliness, Karen, what’s that like?

Karen:   I think often feeling overwhelmingly alienated or like there’s no one who cares or there’s no one who really understands me. The statistics on loneliness in our culture today are just extraordinary. Particularly in a time when we seem to be so connected as far as the technologies are concerned.

David:   So, are we talking older people? I mean, we’re older. Is that our age group?

Karen:   No, we’re not older. We’re living longer. We’re changing the terminology remember?

David:   I remember you reading to me. We’re no longer.

Karen:   We’re not supposed to say we’re aging. We’re supposed to say we’re living longer. It’s much of a problem among young people and among the rest of the population. Let me give you some statistics. One of the measurements is how many close friends do you have that you can turn to in a crisis? And this question was asked by pollsters. The most common answer in the past used to be five. How many people can you turn to when you’re in a crisis? That’s a question.

David:   It’s a good question. Yeah.

Karen:   So, people used to say well five, maybe there were more. Today the most common answer is none.

David:   The most common answer is no, none. Okay.

Karen:   Half of Americans also say that.

David:   That’s all ages.

Karen:   That’s all yeah. Half of Americans also say that nobody really knows them well.

David:   Wow.

Karen:   So, we go into depression, we feel alienation. And I think it’s a form of feeling lost. Like we don’t have a tribe or a community or a network into which we belong. So, this feeling that…

David:   I can understand that. What about church people? Do…

Karen:   I haven’t run into those stats on church people.

David:   I would hope that it’s not that way with church people.

Karen:   Yeah, I think there were some that I’m sorry I didn’t pull for this podcast, but that people who attend church regularly even once a month have less of a statistic on loneliness than those who don’t go out on. That’s something. The Cigna Insurance Health Survey, this is the Cigna Insurance Company, took 20,000 individuals and they asked questions about loneliness, and they were aged 18 and over. Okay.

David:   They would have to be, we’re not talking street people now because they’re not going to.

Karen:   The part of Cigna’s program.

David:   Yeah. So, we’re talking about people who have at least some kind of income.

Karen:   Income enough to have insurance. So…

David:   Yeah. Well, it’s possible they did it with a random group. I don’t know.

Karen:   Yeah, I don’t know. It doesn’t say so we don’t really know. 46 reports sometimes are always feeling lonely. 46% reports sometimes are always feeling lonely. 47 % say they feel left out.

David:   So that’s similar. Okay.

Karen:   47 % say they do not have meaningful in person social interactions or extended conversations on a daily basis. David, just, you know, what is that?

David:   Yeah, I don’t relate to those feelings at all.

Karen:   But just think it’s almost half your culture.

David:   Yeah, right. Half of the American culture. Yes.

Karen:   43 % sometimes are always feel the relationships they have aren’t meaningful.

David:   Okay, so you’re talking that that could include marriage or family.

Karen:   Yeah. They have a relationship that doesn’t feel meaningful.

David:   Yeah, it’s surface.

Karen:   43 % report feeling isolated. And I’m just going to read a little bit forgive me if I sound reading but…

David:   …that’s all right. So, it’s ending up that a little less than half.

Karen:  Right.

David:   This is huge.

Karen:   This is huge. Middle 40% and the shifts into these high statistics have gone on over the last 10 or 15 years they’ve been very sudden. This is a really rapid sociological movement.

David:   Wow that’s in spite of all of Facebook and all the rest.

Karen:   It’s by the loneliest. Are young adults between the ages of 18 and 22?

David:   Oh, my goodness. Okay just one second now because you’re talking young adults 18 to 22. I got it and that’s the most significant where they’re feeling at the most. That’s college age 18 to 22.

Karen:   This age group also related their health, the lowest, which correlates with the health sciences link, loneliness with a greater risk for obesity, heart disease, anxiety, dementia, and reduced lifespan. In fact, maintaining strong and healthy social connections has been linked to a 50 % reduced risk of early death. So, if you have those connections, if you don’t feel lonely, because of those connections your early death risk is reduced by 50%. So, they’re obviously not just focusing on the 18 to 22 year old group.

David:   Yeah, so also I’m just trying to process it. When you say loneliness, my mind kind of quickly goes to street people. This is not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about something that’s endemic. You can say at least 45 % of the population is feeling this way or feeling it sometimes.

Karen:   Studies have shown that people who are lonely are more likely to experience higher levels of perceived stress, increased inflammation, and the medical community is attributing a lot of our diseases to inflammation in our body. So, this increases inflammation, reduced immune function, and poor sleep. In fact, Theresa May, the previous Prime Minister in Britain, the statistics in England were so bad that she had to appoint a Minister of Loneliness. I think it’s a cabinet role.

David:   That’s fascinating. So, what we’re saying is this is not just an American problem.

Karen:   No, it’s a worldwide problem.

David:   Well at least the Western world.

Karen:   Yeah, as far as we know. So, what do we do about that? I mean this should ramp up the energies of everyone who cares about people who is compassionate, who is concerned about where the young are, where midlifers are, where oldsters are, and then we need to design and talk about what we can do to help alleviate the loneliness.

David:   I’m just getting a whole different picture in my mind because if you ask the question what comes to mind age-wise when we consider the topic of loneliness, I think of an elderly folks home.

Karen:   They’re probably the least lonely because they have one another. They eat their meals together, they get to know one another, they talk about what you’ve done in your life. I mean I don’t know the stats on that.

David:   That’s fascinating because it’s the younger age, the college age really that seems to be in the biggest trouble regarding it. I wonder if this is something that’s gone on all the time. I wonder for example if they took polls in Jesus’ time. There must have been a lot of lonely people.

Karen:   Yeah, maybe.

David:   We don’t know it. Maybe it’s just an academic thought and not even relevant. It is true that there is a huge problem within our culture of loneliness.

Karen:   Let’s talk about things that we can do because I would say that there was a time in my life when I did experience loneliness and I wrote a book called Lonely No More. So, I know what that’s about and there were a lot of things that contributed to it. One is we became well known in the religious world very fast and fame itself is isolating. People want to be popular or to have fame or to be known in the headlines or whatever it is.

David:   Isn’t that interesting?

Karen:   That may be one of the most things…

David:   It doesn’t scratch the itch.

Karen:   No, most deadly things because you get isolated because of your fame. So let’s talk about what people who are lonely can do because a lot of studies then go into suggestions that way. So, for those people who are listening to this podcast we want to make sure today that those people have some tools. So one is to really begin to not let the feeling of loneliness overwhelm and defeat you because there are things you can do. You want to connect as much as you’re able to. So, join whatever group it is that you can find where you can become a member. Remember that suits some of your interests. Join a volunteer gardeners’ group where people go around and help older people, for instance, who maybe are not able to keep up with their gardening anymore. A volunteer group of any kind that helps other people or just helping other people call the hospital and see if they have need for volunteers to come in and whatever they could do, take those carts around, whatever, anything like that will begin to connect the lonely person with human interaction. So that’s really good to do. One of my mantras is if you’re not being invited into other people’s lives, invite people into your life. With that high of a percentage, 45 % of people being lonely, you’re going to hit a button with other lonely people even without knowing that they’re lonely. They may not look lonely. So just start inviting people over and one of my favorite things is have a pie night and everyone brings a favorite pie. It doesn’t matter if they make it or if they just go out and buy it, but you have a sample pie night where everyone samples pies and you invite them into your home. It’s easy, it doesn’t require a lot of work and it’s just a great way to get introduced to people and get people talking. And then have some questions that we’ve used to get to know groups. In fact, we did this with our teenagers. I think we mentioned this before. We would say to them, have five questions that you can ask anyone in the back of your mind.

David:   Well, that was done if you’d go on a date …at least have five questions.

Karen:   At least have five questions. So, I would recommend to lonely people who are inviting others into their life, having five questions.

David:   You just went over people’s heads because they can’t think of five questions. So yeah, standard questions.

Karen:   We’re sitting around eating pies. So, we don’t want it just to be chitchat, although even chitchat is better than nothing. But let’s design some questions.

David:   The reason you’re asking the questions is to get it out of yourself into understanding what other people are like.

Karen:   So, the whole group can get to know one another.

David:   If you had a perfect day, it was one of the best days you could possibly imagine what’s going on. Or similar to that, if you could have a day that you would live over again, what would be one of those days? And you’re not asking that of yourself, you’re asking that of yourself. of the other person.

Karen:   Right. And along with that, if money were no object, where in the world would you like to travel? That’s another one.

David:   Oh yeah, all those are related. What’s on your bucket list?

Karen:   One question I’d like to ask is we could sit around in a group and think of the one person who had the most impact in our life. Who is the one person who has had the most impact in your life? One of the persons who has had the most impact…

David:   My generation had heroes. What about your generation? I’m talking to a young person. Who are your heroes? Yeah, oh, they’re all kinds of questions.

Karen:   All kinds of questions.

David:   Those are easy for us because we’ve asked them thousands of times and we basically come up with the core belief that people are very interesting.

Karen:   Yes. So, the only person who is listening to us now. Connect in whatever way that you can. Invite people into your home. Go to the places where people are. Meet in a coffee shop. There are lots of places to meet. Local public library. So, what you want to do is sit down and make a list of all the ways you can connect rather than bundling yourself up in your isolation, drawing it around you, feeling more and more disconnected like no one cares that you have no one to go to. I want to go back to the idea of volunteering to do something with a group that needs volunteers. And there was a book written on what happens to us when we do that. Volunteer to go to the school and be an adult who helps with the kids. A teacher needs someone else in the class from the project and you give your name on the list. When we do that sort of thing, it is true when we help others, we help ourselves. So, that’s really what we want to do is to get ourselves in a place where we are volunteering in a way that helps others because this thing connects us. It creates attachments between you and those groups you’re volunteering with, and it begins to assuage the loneliness condition that you’ve been in.

David:   Loneliness is alleviated when you are in a position of being a good listener.

Karen:   That’s right. In fact, there is a synchronicity that occurs between the brain of the one who’s speaking in the one who’s listening.

David:   That’s a great word and I’m not sure I know what it means.

Karen:   A connection. Just put it that way, okay?

David:   I’m with you.

Karen:   There are sociological terms for this, but you feel connected to someone who tells you their story, even if you’re not telling them your story.

David:   But it’s even better if you can tell your story as well.

Karen:   Yeah, and that’s part of the beauty and the brilliance and the miracle really of the listening process. But there are ways then, sometimes we have noticed that when we ask questions, people are so thrilled to have anyone interested in them that they talk, and we discover these fascinating things about them. But they never return a question to us. So, we have learned that in order to create a mutuality, one of the things we need to do is to say, well, that’s interesting. Can I tell you about this thing that happened to me that’s like that? Or, oh, I know exactly what you’re talking about. This is what happened to me in that way. And so you interject because you haven’t been asked to do that because people are not good at doing that. You interject your story in a way that is appropriate to their storytelling. And then you create this cohesive nymph. People just have to learn how to do that.

David:   Yeah, and you model it yourself. You know, if you had asked me that question, here’s what I would have said. If you don’t do that, you burn out asking questions after a while because you find that people are not good at asking questions.

Karen:   No, they’re not. And I think really, it’s more there’s such a flush that they feel. And there is a physiological flush when someone asks you a question and is interested about your whole body is responding. One of the things that we do in group settings where there’s conversation bouncing back and forward and generally we try and focus on an idea that everyone is dealing with is the person who is silent, who is either shy or doesn’t have the capability of jumping into a robust conversation. They sort of sit back and you say, you haven’t said anything for a while. What are your thoughts on this? I can’t remember anyone who ever said I’m not thinking I don’t have any thoughts on it. You know, I’ve gone blank. They always have thoughts, and you just give them a chance to contribute.

David:   And I never sense that the group thought, you know, don’t waste your time. I think they all were feeling, how do we draw this person in?

Karen:   Yeah,

David:   …because he or she has been quiet.

Karen:   Right. So, the point of it is really if you’re lonely, if you’ve experienced that feeling in a way, that’s a gift because it can give you empathy and compassion understanding about how other lonely people feel. Obviously, there’s so many of them and you can use that loneliness to bridge those gaps between humans.

David:   Loneliness is alleviated when there is someone to listen to and understand what is being said. Does that tie somewhat the two topics together?

Karen:   I think it pretty much ties them together well.

David:   Loneliness is alleviated when there is someone to listen to and understand what is being said. So don’t think this is going to be awkward. You just think I’m gonna plunge in and I’m going to listen. I’m going to be a good listener. Yeah, loneliness, the problem is immense and because it’s so immense, I think people just say if I try to resolve that problem, it’ll overwhelm me and the truth is it will, if you think you’re going to solve the problem nationally, but you can solve it within your own little world. Okay, we haven’t resolved all that could be said regarding this topic, but we’ve poked at it a little and I trust it would be helpful and many others would continue to poke around the edges and pretty soon we’ll get to the middle of it all. God be with you, friend.

Outgo:   You’ve been listening to the Before We Go podcast. And if you would like to write to us, please send us an email at the following address: hosts@beforewego.show. That’s all lower-case letters: hosts@beforewego.show.  If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please remember to rate, review, and share on whatever platform you listen. This podcast is copyright 2023 by Mainstay Ministries, Post Office Box 30, Wheaton, Illinois 60187.

Comforting One Another is one of Karen’s books using Michelangelo’s Pieta as a metaphor for learning how to comfort those hurting in life.